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What a silly thing to say. Just because its shounen doesn't mean there isn't going to be any romance.

Quote:

Originally Posted by NoOneKnowS

Sometimes too much action is a bad thing. Fusing in romance w/ it would make it better IMHO since it would affect the characters development; mindset in battle and inspiration etc...

Late, but what the heck...

The truth is though, while it's not totally impossible for shounen series to have romance (As in, relationships that actually exist, and not just a figment of fans' imagination), it is very, VERY, low on the priority list.

Meaning you'll see Allen pwning Noahs WAY before you'll him get any girl...

... Well, except maybe Road

Funny thing is though, despite the low importance of romance, it has always been the fans' greatest interest

The truth is though, while it's not totally impossible for shounen series to have romance (As in, relationships that actually exist, and not just a figment of fans' imagination), it is very, VERY, low on the priority list.

Meaning you'll see Allen pwning Noahs WAY before you'll him get any girl...

... Well, except maybe Road

Funny thing is though, despite the low importance of romance, it has always been the fans' greatest interest

Well; you pretty much sum up everything a shonen manga has to offer. Little to no romance at all and fanboys/girls eventually paring up each and every main characters out there on the series.

Though yeah; either the mangaka is blind or she's just the following the "taboo" of shonen manga. Though I'd would definitely be a breath of fresh air if Allen and Lenalee would hook up before the series "ever" ends.

Find it odd seems like no one did a full summary on chapter 145 here. Here are some spoilers for all.

Spoiler:

Remember that Glasses dude who has a deep friendship w/ Suman? (Can't remember his name sorry) = He and an akuma meaning = Human+Akuma = lvl4. That was all we got from this chapter though. But what's more shocking was that; was that Bak? dying?

I just made a quick read on the manga though. I'm a little confused and all that. Guido or some other hardcore DGM reader might be able to do a more accurate summary.

To naruto89 and everyone at this thread I apologize for being late to post my summary for this week's D.Gray-man manga chapter.

I do appreciate that someone besides me is posting some tidbits, sneak preview, or plainly spoil pic to let everyone know what will be going on in the next chapter.

However, naruto89 if you want to post a spoiler for next time please do so inside spoiler tags.

Ex:
[ SPOILER ]Write text here[/ SPOILER ]

Write the spoiler tags just like I have posted them above but be sure to remove the blank spaces, got it?

OK.

Let's move on with the summary for chapter 145.

Spoiler:

145th Night: Darkness Four

When everyone have thought they could rest after Lulubell's raid Reneé Epstein, USA branch, looks in horror shouting Bak's name.

The Skull leader, who has been encased inside the crystal field along with the Skull Tapp, berates the humans to be fools because not a single one of them can stop Akuma for they are living weapons.

Glasses guy, Johnny, barely had a close shave with death as he bears witness in horror how the Lv. 3 Akuma that once were inside the giant Akuma are starting to convulse and giving off spams.
In a sea of blood, corpses, flesh, and monster gore the level 3 begin metamorphosing by tearing off their mechanical bodies, as human-look alike flesh starts to seep and sprout from the openings. Their bodies contort as they keep on fusing with each other changing into organic flesh.
The transformation stops, and Johnny is mute horrified at the sight of a beautiful female figure, who both stands erect in the form of a statue above a pile of Akuma and human corpses and looks fully human at 100% percent.
The female remains motionless and stiff in the same position and seems as she's praying. Her belly is swollen indicating that she's pregnant and has a number '4' in bold carved on her belly.

Activity inside the Akuma-woman's belly can be heard, as the presence within it makes a louder and rumbling noise by the minute.

Johnny in tears apologizes to his comrades for it is his fault due to acting recklessly at attempting to save Skull-Tapp.
Quickly jumping to a flashback sequence, when Johnny was slammed right at the face of a seemingly dead, giant Akuma its eye opened up and from within arms sprouted grabbing glasses guy.

Bak acted on quick thinking, and gathering the few surviving members of the scientist staff, encased the head with the light shield of the reflectors. He then threw a reflector to Reneé and told her to encase the Skull leader and Skull-Tapp inside the light barrier before they jumped into the black-ark's portal, which she successfully accomplished.

Immediately, Bak and the others jumped on top of the Akuma face while the barrier was active and safely pulled out Johnny, then warned the rest of the men to pull back and to stay away from the Akuma, but the barrier cracked.

Returning to the current moment, Allen quickly arrives at the scene of the slaughter; Johnny can't stop weeping.

While his cursed eye continues to vibrate madly, Allen witnesses the seemingly-dead corpses of Bak, Reever, and some of the other scientists, although all are in one piece and in a perfect condition in spite of lying on a sea of blood.

Then, Allen hears the sound of a painful moan and looks at the pile of corpses. One of the scientists is barely living, although the Akuma virus has already progressed past the point of no return in his body. With his last breath and effort the scientist points for Allen to look upward and warns him that 'it' has evolved.

Allen looks upwards as instructed and gasps in horror observing that the Akuma-woman is now arching backwards. The thing that was inside her belly has already burst out, thus the Akuma gave birth to itself nearly similar when a human female gives birth to her own child.

All that's left is the dried-up body of the Akuma woman, looking like the husk of a cicada after finally emerging from its molten skin.

Allen stays on alert, and its left-eye is checking up for activity in the surrounding vicinity; the sinister laughter grows louder.

Finally, the critter appears from behind the pile of corpses, having used Johnny's racket as distraction to hide itself right after being 'borned', to make its presence known before Allen.

Before Allen stands the recently evolved Akuma, which is roughly the size of an average human. Nearly all of his body is organic and made of flesh, wearing Akuma decorations or stripes on his arms, legs, and neck. An inverted, pentacle star is carved on his belly. The joints on his wrists, elbows, upper arms, upper legs, knee caps, ankles, around the mid-section of his stomach, and on his neck are visible. His face is fully human though still bears some reminiscence to that of a giant akuma's. Angelic wings have sprouted from his back, while two angelic halos, a small one placed on top of a large one, are placed on top of his head.

The demonic entity annonces to Allen that he's the LV. 4 with four being the number of despair.

Spoiler:

Ok. How I was waiting for this event, the arrival of the lv. 4!

The first akuma which was portrayed evolving was Pierrot from the Ghost of Matel arc, and that specifically happened on chapter 8 of the manga.

It means that we (the readers) had to wait 136 chapters from Pierrot's evolution to see another akuma evolution in the current manga chapter.

What it seems too unfair for us, the readers, is the fact that the manga-ka has never introduced another akuma evolution during all this long lapse.

I mean we have seen the evolution from Lv. 1 to Lv. 2, and in this chapter we now have witnessed the evolution from Lv. 3 to Lv. 4 but never will have a chance to watch how the evolution happens from Lv. 2 to Lv. 3, which IMO is a pity.

Spoiler:

-Johnny was getting swallowed into the eye of the giant Akuma, prompting Bak and the others to take quick action.

Although they successfully rescued Johnny, their operation costed them fatally.

-The barrier failed and more arms sprouted, seemingly killing Bak and the others, save for Johnny. A few Lv.3 inside the giant emerged and started clamping and fusing with each other, thus paving way for the next evolution process.

As the akuma spliced with each other in a mad and violent rage of gore and flesh, the fused entity tore off and shed the mechanical parts of the former Lv. 3 akuma, developing living, organic flesh. At this point, the entity grew in size and defined its form and shape to become fully human at the end of the process.

-At first it looked like the process stopped, thus fulfilling the outcome of the evolution in the form of a full human lady about 15 ft. to 20 ft. in height and whose body clearly showed signs of pregnancy, but this was the intermediate point before concluding evolution to Lv. 4

Thus, from now on I will refer to this halfway stage as Lv. 3.5 or the Mother Akuma. Originally, I thought to name this half-stage as 'Akuma Lady' or 'Akuma Maiden' but seeing as the figure is obviously pregnant, I deemed the 'mother' theme to be more fitting.

-Signs of life from within the Mother Akuma's womb could be heard. The thing inside forcefully bursted outside from its mother's womb, thus symbollically giving birth to the newly-evolved Lv. 4 Akuma.

...But the Level 4 Now that's one heck of a transformation. Like the giant Akumas, the Lv 4 are a fusion of several Akumas. In this case, several Lv 3 akumas.

I share the general opinion that the level 4 is just plain ugly for a angelic demon.

The level 4's evolution did take place under rather unique conditions. Unique enough that it might be a single case but unlikely for future developments. Too lazy to list them out but among them is the literal birth of a new Akuma from a supposedly dead one. Progression from one stage to another normally is marked by the number of lives the akuma has taken but in this case it's not.

Adding to Guido's 3.5 Mother Akuma, I would think the giant Akuma is the necessary stage 3.25 for level 3s to cross over into level 4.

Quote:

I take back what I've said a few weeks ago, that perhaps... Just maybe, a Lv 4... might be equal or stronger than a Noah. And they could be a class of Akumas that don't take orders from them.

After all, unlike Noahs, Akumas can continuously evolve.

Perhaps indeed. I had always thought the giant akumas were a waste of good material since all they do is shoot beams. Sure it's powerful and destructive but imagine the hundreds of level 3's unique abilities activated at once instead of beams. Discounting the "weaker" abilities like the trio in the recent anime episodes, manga level 3's like Eshi and Thread bring the pain. In both cases it took rather dire measures to take them down.

And why all the above? Once it's taken into account that several level 3's, all highly powerful and with their unique abilities, are used to form a level 4, it's a rather ugly picture. ()

For their evolution, I'm of the impression it's like the level bar in RPGs and such, that once you 'level up', you have to start clean again to level up. Meaning for the akuma to take even more lives than in all their previous stages, which I don't really see that happening much for level 4s.

Now for the real question: Can the level 4 Akuma seriously threaten Exorcists on the level of the Generals and Allen?

Quote:

P.S -More than anything though, I'm interested in what it said.

"4 is the number of despair"

Does anyone have any insight about that?

The number of death in Mandarin after all. 4 sounds like si, which means death, for those not familiar with the connotation. Allen not counting, there are 4 Generals left in present time. 4 level 4's for one General each?

Quote:

P.P.S - Could we consider the Lv 4 to be an 'Angel'? Perhaps like EVA ?

And that maybe, if it even exist, a Lv 5 would look perfectly human.

As much as I would like to see the connection, there really isn't much to connect the level 4 akuma to Angels or EVA.

And for a totally human level 5 that would wicked.

And combining those two thoughts together, a level 5 befriending Allen later on?

Adding to Guido's 3.5 Mother Akuma, I would think the giant Akuma is the necessary stage 3.25 for level 3s to cross over into level 4.

About that, I must say that the folks on Wiki sure update the site pretty fast

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tormenk

Now for the real question: Can the level 4 Akuma seriously threaten Exorcists on the level of the Generals and Allen?

That is the half-million dollar question for this week.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tormenk

The number of death in Mandarin after all. 4 sounds like si, which means death, for those not familiar with the connotation. Allen not counting, there are 4 Generals left in present time. 4 level 4's for one General each?

Believe me, that was my first thought as well (being chinese and all), but it just doesn't seem right to me. And base on what (little) I know, I can't recalled any biblical demons using that number for that word.

So I tried my luck and went on wiki... And guess what I found?

The four horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Conquest, War, Famine and Death.

Yup, plenty of despair there.

(Remember, this is just my best guess)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tormenk

As much as I would like to see the connection, there really isn't much to connect the level 4 akuma to Angels or EVA.

And for a totally human level 5 that would wicked.

And combining those two thoughts together, a level 5 befriending Allen later on?

- Well, I was just poking at the Lv 4 for being more organic than machine .

(Some lv 2s not counting...)

- Wicked... In every meaning of the word

- Come to think about it, if an Akuma evolves to the point when it has no soul, does it mean that Allen can't see it?

He might still detect it's presence, but could he still tell it apart from a human in the crowd?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tworble

Katsura Hoshina sounds quite mysterious, I mean no one has even seen her...are we sure she isn't Tim Burton in drag?

Holy Crap, D-Gray hasn't slowed down a bit lately....Lvl 4 Akuma ehh?.....Wonder what kind of abilities It'll have. Allen's at critical so he sure wont be a pushover to the lvl 4 Akuma, even though he's been fighting for some time. But man, I have to agree with everyone else, that thing is one ugly ass creature!

Death can be portrayed as an Angel, the name of which is Azrael, the Angel of Death, though the bible and Qu'ran don't say this, they use different names.

The Angel of Death, synonymous with the form of the most recent lvl. 4? (And quite frankly the only one so far)....

4 is also a homonym for the number of Death in Chinese lore, (I would know...I am Chinese....)

Death is also one of the FOUR horsemen of the apocalypse, as has already been said...

(Far out connection, but it was worth a decent shot)

Perhaps, as to the power level of a level 4, the upgrade from 2 to 3 is enormous, it took Lenalee's innocence pretty much all it had at the time to destroy Eshi, whereas she could take down lvl. 2's easily.

Perhaps, it would take a general or Allen an insane amount of effort and will to put a lvl 4. Akuma out of commission.